The shadow warrior backed away, spitting blood. He pressed himself against one wall, seemingly exhausted, only to dodge away at the last moment as Gravenholtz swung again. Gravenholtz’s fist hit the wall hard, and he whirled around, cursing. It didn’t make sense, but Moseby thought it looked like the rock face had cracked under the blow.
The shadow warrior moved in, jerked back, then sweep-kicked Gravenholtz off his feet. He tromped the redhead’s ankle, then turned and scrambled up the sheer rock face, faster and faster, pulling himself higher with fingertips and toes, blood running down his chin. It was an amazing feat, even for a shadow warrior, and the crowd fell silent for a minute, then commenced jeering, expecting him to fall at any moment.
The shadow warrior didn’t fall, but redoubled his efforts while Gravenholtz raged below, beating on the rock walls. As he reached the top of the slope, the Raider with the broken nose pumped the butt of his rifle at the shadow warrior’s head. Missed. Missed. Missed. Holding on to an outcropping of rock with one hand, the shadow warrior grabbed the rifle away with the other—he shot the Raider twice in the chest before losing his grip and tumbling back down the ravine. He lay still, one leg twisted under him.
Beer bottles shattered around the shadow warrior, the men on top screaming for the redhead to tear his head off.
Gravenholtz snarled the crowd into silence, then limped across the rocks and stood over the crumpled shadow warrior. The wind howled around them, the flames from the torches sending shadows across the redhead’s bare, freckled skin. With his muscled torso and skull tufted with short reddish hair, Gravenholtz looked more like a hyena than a man. He squatted, picked up two of the shadow warrior’s teeth, and shook them in his fist. The clicking sound echoed off the rocks. He grinned as he tossed the teeth, snapped his fingers. “Snake eyes!” He scanned the faces along the rim of the arena.
Moseby tucked in his chin, moved out of Gravenholtz’s line of sight.
Gravenholtz grabbed the shadow warrior by the back of the neck, held him up for all to see. “He’s not dead, don’t worry.” He beamed as the shadow warrior groaned. “See? Fedayeen are hard to kill. We’re going to play with this one for a long time.”
The crowd cheered.
“Give him a week, he’ll be ready again.” Gravenholtz tossed the shadow warrior onto the rocks. He wiped his forehead with the back of his hand. Touched his ear and winced. He kicked the shadow warrior, looked up at the rim. “I’m thirsty. Which one of you peckerwoods wants to buy me a drink?”
The crowd roared.
Moseby joined the throng moving slowly back through the woods, listening to their happy voices, their obscene glee in the fate of the shadow warrior, their delight in the prowess of their redheaded champion. They were right. Moseby had never seen a shadow warrior beaten like that. Not by anyone other than another Fedayeen, and Gravenholtz was no Fedayeen. What was he, though?
Moseby peeled off from the group, shivering now as he remembered his promise to teach the redhead a lesson. The shadow warrior was fast and skillful, deadlier than Moseby had been in his prime, and he was long past that point. Yeah, the shadow warrior was good, but Gravenholtz was better. Clouds slid across the horn of the moon, darkening the night as Moseby made his way back toward the shack. He walked heavier now and there was ice in his guts. He wasn’t tired. Shadow warriors didn’t get tired. That’s what they told themselves anyway. No, Moseby wasn’t tired. He was scared.
Chapter 12
Leo squirmed as Rakkim shoved his head through the hole in the painted plywood. His Ident collar caught for a second, making him howl.
“Smile,” said Rakkim, sticking his own head through a hole.
The camera buzzed. The photographer yawned, handed Rakkim two photo buttons as they stepped from behind the plywood.
Rakkim pinned a button on Leo’s chest, pinned the other one on himself. Rakkim and Leo pictured as white-robed angels carrying assault rifles.
Leo wiped his nose. “I think I’m getting a cold.”
“Could be malaria,” said Rakkim.
“Yes…yes, that’s possible,” said Leo. “Sleeping on the beach…all those mosquitoes. This country is a hellhole of disease and poverty and…” He pressed a hand against his forehead. “I’ve got a fever.”
“Sounds like elephantiasis. Maybe leprosy.”
Leo pursed his lips. You could fool him, but not for long. “How amusing. How droll.”
They pressed their way through the swarm of tourists surrounding the Mount Carmel memorial, the monument to the Branch Davidian martyrs a bigger draw than the nearby Waco rodeo and cow palace. Late afternoon, the air heavy, sweat cutting trails through the dust on their faces in the East Texas heat. The two of them strolled among suburban families wearing DAMN THE ATF T-shirts, and teenagers with David Koresh masks pushed back on their foreheads as they munched fried Snickers bars. Rakkim led Leo toward Stevenson’s Fair Deal Emporium.
All the skin on parade made it hard not to stare: bare arms, bare legs, bare midriffs, short shorts and tube tops and hip-huggers. Hard to tell the harlots from the housewives here. A change since his last visit over three years ago. The Belt was Christian, but evidently the holy rollers had stopped demanding modesty among believers, more concerned with simply maintaining the faith. Let the Muslims fight to the death over doctrine, the Belt needed whatever unity it could maintain.
Rakkim listened to the twangs and drawls, the low, laconic slur of the delta, the rapid-fire urban hustle of Atlanta—layers upon layers, the sights and sounds and smells of a thousand small towns. Young toughs bulled their way through the crowd, eyeing the cutie-pies as they puffed away on foul cheroots. Small black remote-controlled helicopters dipped and soared overhead. A little girl wailed at her snow cone fallen to the pavement as her father dragged her to a stand selling personalized, gold-embossed Bibles.
A trio of nuns walked past arm in arm, delicately eating individual kernels of kettle corn they plucked from small paper bags. The youngest nun blushed as she licked her fingers and Rakkim smiled, imagining the exquisite conflict her pleasure must give her. The young nun turned back, glanced at Rakkim, held his eyes for a moment. He watched her hurry away, tiny feet kicking up dust, and Rakkim thought of the devout women back home, faces circled by head scarves, some masked behind veils, hair tucked out of sight…he felt again the erotic charge of those women not completely of this world.
Leo stood entranced before a holographic info panel detailing the attack and siege of Mount Carmel by federal authorities that began on Sunday, February 28, 1993. The panel blended actual news footage with re-creations that showed the Feds pounding on the door of the compound attempting to serve David Koresh with a subpoena for illegal weapons. In the shootout that followed, four federal officers were killed and David Koresh wounded. The siege began with approximately one hundred Davidians holed up inside Mount Carmel, surrounded by FBI, ATF, and army National Guard units. Rakkim dragged Leo away from the panel as a beatific Koresh lay bleeding, attended by white-robed children.
Leo tugged at his Ident collar. The narrow titanium collar wasn’t tight—it was the idea of it that chafed. Rakkim didn’t blame him. The collar was necessary, though. Only way for an outlander like Leo to escape notice was to hide in plain sight.
Who’s ever going to believe I’m a retard? Leo had asked as Rakkim slipped the collar around his neck.
You haven’t got the skills to pull that off, kid. I’m just asking you to look like a loser. Rakkim’s hand had darted out, lightly brushed across Leo’s scalp. Clumps of hair drifted down until Rakkim slid his knife back, admiring his handiwork. Leo’s hair was gouged, as though cut by someone either indifferent or incompetent. That’s better.
Plenty of Idents in the Belt. Indentured servants—the poor, the slow-witted, the unlucky, all of them trading years of their lives to learn a trade or pay off a debt. Idents always looked out of place. Even more important, Idents didn’t draw attention. Between Leo’s baby fat, bad haircut, and th
e too-small T-shirt Rakkim had bought for him, Leo might as well be invisible.
Rakkim saw another Ident following a family of four, the Ident huffing and puffing as he lugged bags of souvenirs in one hand, holding an umbrella over the mother with the other. The Ident was white, the family black. Sarah said one of the few good things about the second civil war was that race was now irrelevant. Nobody lost a job or a house because he was the wrong color. Things like that only happened because of important differences. Like being the wrong religion. Christians were tolerated in the Islamic Republic, but they were second-class citizens, passed over for promotion, kept out of the choicest real estate. In the Belt, all Christians were equal, but in many places, Catholics were still treated with suspicion. A young man from All Saints High School looking for a college scholarship would do well to start attending the Power in the Blood Tabernacle.
The Ident stumbled, almost dropped a package, apologizing, head lowered. Rakkim spotted a couple of stolid Texas Rangers, a black and white team, each well over six feet tall, their oversize Stetsons seeming to float above the crowd. During the war, the Rangers became a law unto themselves, keeping the peace by any means necessary. The story went that there wasn’t a white oak in Texas that hadn’t been a hanging tree, but while most of the Belt had been wracked with riots and looting, the streets of Texas stayed safe. Almost thirty years after the truce between the Belt and the Islamic Republic, the Rangers still operated as judge, jury, and executioner.
A group of young Louisiana National Guardsmen emerged from a tattoo parlor, fleshette rifles slung casually over their shoulders, rolled sleeves showing off their new ink. The usual gung-ho tats: flags and screaming eagles, the stone rolled away from the tomb, and Mecca’s Kaaba with a mushroom cloud. A muscular Guardsman launched a toy helicopter, guided it around a corn dog stand, then lost control, the helicopter swooping low, knocking the white Ranger’s hat askew before cartwheeling into the dirt. The Guardsmen laughed, and the muscular one ambled over, mumbled an apology. As the Guardsman bent to retrieve the helicopter, the Ranger drew his stainless-steel revolver in one quick, fluid movement and whipped the barrel across the Guardsman’s head, laid him out. The others shouted, hands sliding along the slings of their rifles. The white Ranger slowly crushed the chopper under his boot while the black Ranger watched the Guardsmen, a toothpick migrating across his mouth.
The crowd gave the Rangers and Guardsmen room, but Rakkim stayed put.
The Guardsmen hesitated, then quickly dragged their comrade away.
“I…I don’t like it here,” Leo whispered to Rakkim.
“I do,” said Rakkim, the words escaping him before he was even aware of the thought.
Stevenson’s store was in the same spot as the last time Rakkim had seen it, but it was even bigger now, the cross on top state-of-the-art, shimmering with color and so realistic you could see the grain in the wood. SOUVENIRS, ARCANA, RELICS flashed from the wallscreens. A steady stream of dusty pilgrims flowed in and out of the line of revolving doors, air-conditioning leaking out into the heat. A Crusader stood outside in full mock-armor, visor up, sweat streaming down his face, handing out lollypops to the children.
Rakkim pushed Leo ahead of him, into the revolving door. The interior of the shop smelled faintly of frankincense, the smoldering incense barely covering the scent of spilled soda and popcorn. Portraits of David Koresh stared from every wall, including a black velvet painting of Koresh facing Elvis priced at $1,999. Steer horns laser-etched with Bible verses, a bargain at $159.99. Miniatures of the Mount Carmel compound made of everything from cooked macaroni to beaten silver. A Janet Reno voodoo doll with her fangs painted red. Rocks and bits of charred wood from the original compound in bulletproof glass cases with certificates of authenticity. A little girl tugged at her mother’s dress, pointed at one of the many kites dangling from the ceiling: Jesus in the clouds overlooking the firestorm, reaching out to welcome Koresh into the heavens, the clouds around them bloodred in the glow.
Leo fingered a display of toy U.S. Army tanks, ignoring the PLEASE, NO TOUCHING sign. He tapped a command into the underside, the tank clanking noisily, treads spinning as hot sparks flashed from the pivoting barrel of the tank cannon. Smoke wafted through the cool air, rippling the small devil’s pentagram flag atop the tank.
Stevenson himself barreled over in faded jeans, spangled cowboy shirt, and cowboy boots, scrawny as ever, a hand-rolled cigarette between his lips. “You buying that, melonhead?” He noticed Rakkim. Stared. “That you?”
Rakkim looked back at him. Leo still hung on to the tank.
“It is you.” A bit of ash fell from the tip of Stevenson’s cigarette, drifted toward the floor. “You look different.” He peered at Rakkim, his tiny eyes hard as river rock.
“Must be the new Swedish night cream I’ve been using,” said Rakkim. “Tightens the pores.”
Stevenson waved back an approaching security guard. He flicked the photo button on Rakkim’s chest. “You could have bought that cheaper here. Three ninety-nine apiece and half off a grandstand ticket to the reenactment. You got taken, son.”
“That’s what vacation is all about,” said Rakkim.
Stevenson snorted. “You ain’t never been on vacation your whole life. Same as me.” He watched Leo tapping commands into the tank. “Let’s adjourn to my office,” he said, starting down the aisle. A press of his hand against the wall plate and the heavy door slid open. A tattered American flag was mounted on one wall, its edges singed. Stevenson sat in an over-stuffed leather command chair behind a heavy oak desk. He was creased and cracked from the sun, somewhere around fifty, his gray hair buzzed short, a tough, ugly banty rooster, more gristle than meat.
Rakkim sat opposite Stevenson, stretched out his legs while Leo lumbered around the room, touching everything.
Stevenson poured whiskey into a couple of cut crystal glasses, handed one to Rakkim. A glance at Leo. “You want a soda pop, junior?”
Leo ignored him, stood before the flag. He put a hand over his heart. The wrong hand.
Stevenson clinked glasses with Rakkim. “Sorry about Redbeard. Damn shame.”
“Yeah.” Rakkim took a swallow from his glass, felt fire slide down his throat. He saw Leo slip the tank’s remote into his pocket. “You’re doing well.”
“A man can’t make money off tourists, he’s too stupid to breathe, but it ain’t all gravy.” Stevenson sucked his teeth, his incisors as yellow as his nicotine-stained knuckles. “Got ten thousand acres outside of San Antonio about to dry up and blow away, and a car dealership with more salesmen than customers. I’m thinking about buying into a savings and loan in Houston. Banking’s near as good as the tourist trade when it comes to easy money.” He took another long swallow, his bony Adam’s apple bobbing. “Muslims ever get past their stupidity about charging interest, they’ll really take over the world.”
Rakkim sipped his whiskey. “Quran forbids it, that settles it.”
“Adapt or die, that’s as true for religion as it is for people.” Stevenson shook out a cigarette from a pack of Virginia broadleaf. The hand-rolled ones must be for the benefit of the tourists. He watched Rakkim from behind a veil of fragrant smoke.
Stevenson had been State Security during the early days of the republic, one of the few non-Muslims in a position of authority, testament to the respect Redbeard had for him. Stevenson had disappeared around twenty years ago, after a problem with the imam of the largest mosque in Seattle. It wasn’t a religious dispute. Stevenson didn’t believe in Christ on the cross or virgins waiting in Paradise. Stevenson didn’t believe in anything he couldn’t taste or touch. The imam had ordered a young woman picked up by the Black Robes. Jewish woman. Esther. Maybe she caught the imam’s eye, or maybe someone turned her in. Whatever, she died before Stevenson could spring her. The next day the imam and his two bodyguards were found dead and Stevenson was gone.
Rakkim had run into Stevenson on one of his first reconnaissance missions into the Belt, saw
him working a small stand at Mount Carmel. They kept each other’s secrets without ever discussing the matter. The Belt paid a million dollars for a captured shadow warrior, and even after all this time, the Black Robes still offered a man’s weight in gold and the blessing of the grand mullah himself for the return of Stevenson. Maybe Rakkim and Stevenson both thought they had enough money and enough blessings. The second time they met, Rakkim brought Stevenson a microphoto of Esther’s grave. The Black Robes had intended to shove her into one of their mass graves, but Redbeard had intervened, had her placed in a non-Muslim cemetery and paid for a small marble stone. They continued their contact after Rakkim retired from the Fedayeen, after he had turned renegade, helping moral criminals escape from the republic: accused witches and Jews, apostates and homosexuals. Rakkim slipped them over the border and into the Belt. Stevenson passed them along, out of harm’s way. Neither of them charged for their services.
Stevenson nodded at Leo. “The Ident collar is a nice touch.”
“I’ve got a businessman up the way needs a Brainiac,” said Rakkim.
“If you say so.” Stevenson sipped his whiskey. “Always a market for a Brainiac. Don’t matter whether it’s here or in your neck of the woods, there’s never enough smart folks. Not when being smart can get you in trouble. Asking questions…that’s dangerous in the best of times, and these ain’t the best of—Would you take your cotton-picking hands off my things?” he barked at Leo.
Leo jerked, dropped the view globe of the sunken city of New Orleans. It rolled across the desk. Rakkim grabbed it just as it was about to fall.
“What do you want from me?” said Stevenson.
“I’m taking him to Tennessee, and wanted to get the lay of the land. That warlord still running G-Burg? What’s his name? The one growing opium for the South Americans.”
Sins of the Assassin Page 11
